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1939 Storm over Europe - AAR


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Hi Ilhughes 41

Firstly, welcome back! :)

In my experience turns don't take much longer to play than older SC games, because we've kept the force pools as low as possible and we now have Garrison units which can at least delay an enemy attack or invasion, thus buying you time to prepare a counterattack.

As to your question about airpower, one significant new improvement with SC WWI is that many units now have the ability to upgrade their Anti-Aircraft capability. Hence a player can reduce the impact of the enemy's ground attack aircraft in a way that wasn't possible before.

I'm pleased to see that you like the AAR and I think you'll have a lot of fun playing it!

Bill

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Thanks Bill. Very encouraging decisions:

1) Force Pool Size -- the WWI and this scenario potential downside for me was increase scale and time.. SC already took a fair commitment of time anyway :-) (though not like Grigsby games ;-) ). So this is welcom news. You might want to suggest making this aspect clearer when promoting the game since definitely influence my buying decision. A lot of turn based gamers are probably have families and this would matter!

2) Anti-air unit upgrades -- this is great news

3) Garrison -- like the mechanism

Any other new features spring to mind?

You are definitely getting me in the buying mode. I hope you'all will organize a tournament after release. I want to have my fanny kicked by folks like you'all and SeaMonkey. I got "decent" at one point and need to be humiliated by masters ;-)

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There are a lot of new features, with some still being tested at the moment.

A full list of those so far included in SC WWI that are above and beyond what were included in Global Conflict can be found here:

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=95162

Quite a few of these improvements, e.g. the zoom, unit swapping, apply whether or not you're playing using the WWI or WWII engines included with the game, and I've just realized while playing out a turn in one of my own games of Storm over Europe that one thing we've probably not highlighted much is the new ability to use aircraft on reconnaissance missions. It can be really handy to avoid running into unforeseen enemy units, or when sub hunting! :)

Bill

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OK - spring not quite here yet, but the advance continues and once the fine weather returns Paris will fall quickly. Turn ended here:

ww2turn8end.jpg

I have successfully driven a wedge as I described last turn in between the newly formed French line near Amiens and the Maginot line. Verdun fell this turn, as did Luxembourg which really I could have taken earlier but used as a block to any French counter attack against my Belgian campaign. Overall this spells curtains for the French - anything that moves to block my drive on Paris will lose its entrenchment, the skies will clear (I hope!) and casualties will be heavy. The overall operation has taken me longer than I wanted as the weather was not kind, but I have gained a few precious turns. I predict Paris will fall in 2 or 3 turns from here.

I thought I would also talk about about one of my pet frustrations in the game - Tech. Here is a slide of my current research investment:

Research.jpg

I am a huge believer in tech advance as a key to victory, but luck plays a huge part and for any new or potential players out there this is the one feature that will certainly either drive you up the wall or make your day. One thing is for sure - it ensures that no two games are the same, and that has to be a good thing in the end.

Anyway in this game so far I discussed my strategy earlier. Fast, aggressive ground assault. This tech slide shows that I have invested heavily in ground assets, though so far without any joy. That's the luck part... I have had one hit so far - in intelligence, a crucial factor for speeding up research acquisition so I have reinvested another chit to try to get to at least level 2, and of course I have a chit in the must have area of industry. I will hope for a bit more luck soon, otherwise my overall strategy will be in doubt, and I want to be able to transfer some of my research to my U boats later on. My air power is strong enough for now, but as a secondary priority I would also dearly love to get my tac air and fighters to level 2 prior to spring 1941 so I hope my scientists wake up and get a move on!

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Okay... it's now May and I think I've pulled off the near impossible with Mother Nature's help of course. When Al attacked in the West there was almost nothing in his path to Paris. If he had driven through the Ardennes/Luxemburg area instead of focusing on the Low Countries first he would have taken Paris before December. There was virtually nothing there to stop him. I had a March strategy in place... meaning I would be fully prepared to slow him and give him a difficult time by March. Long range builds... To delay him I threw units in his path that were too tempting to pass up... i.e. part of the British Expeditionary Force, 2 French Corps and an Army which he obligingly took the time to hammer and destroy. Had he bypassed them and driven straight in they would have been isolated with limited supply and unable to attack or move effectively. Follow up German units could have finished them off. Part of his problem, I presume, is the size of his army or really lack of it. He attacked early having spent critical cash to operate his army west when the units could have easily walked and attacked in May with crushing might. (additional units having been built over winter… Germany can really build a colossal army early in the war) When I attack in May with Germany I can usually force France to surrender by the end of June… so right now I am fairly pleased with my defense since it’s the beginning of May.

I have a very strong block defending Paris with units strategically placed to slow/impede his progress with 2 French HQ’s supporting. I have also slowly abandoned parts of the Maginot Line, leaving key armies to slow a flood into France. That being said… “should” French morale hold a little while longer (very very unlikely)… I think I might be able to buy France 2 or possibly 3 more turns… If so… it places the surrender of France at the beginning of June which would put Germany in a extremely difficult position.

Does he then attack East early with a smaller invasion force than he would have in 41? (July/August… which is not a good time to attack as the weather starts turning bad in September and Russia is huge). He would have to operate his force to the East again spending critical cash that is needed for research and units. Or… does he go for England and risk a prolonged fight which will most assuredly stretch into Spring and Summer 1941. The UK has had the time and cash to build up a large army better equipped than France. There has been no strategic warfare (subs attacking convoys) and the UK has been at peak production since September 1940. By the time an invasion is ready the UK army will be fully deployed and ready with a supporting air force (fighter command). He had a tough winter advancing across France with weak defending French units… imagine him doing that in Russia against a strong Russian defense (Winter 1940) or getting bogged down with bad English weather and an angry Russian bear. (Russia “will” start the war with more armor than the Germans…) An invasion of England will see heavy casualties which will need reinforcement. In addition there is the Royal navy to worry about to secure a crossing.

He has a lot to think about in the coming turns once France falls. I do not envy him at all. The early attack was gutsy and still may work if French morale collapses unexpectedly. In his position, after the capitulation for France, I would probably consolidate my holdings, build a massive army, wait till May 1941 and attack Russia. Then again this is Al we are talking about and he thinks well ‘outside the box.’ There is no telling what he might do or be able to pull off. More than once he has kicked my butt hard and this game is very far from being over. I would not put it past him to try and pull off the impossible…

On a side note: He also took Denmark

On the picture please see how I spread the forward part of the French army out in an attempt to speed bump him. I have cropped out Paris and am letting the French defense of Paris be a surprise… should French morale allow the war to continue to that point. French morale is at 33% and falling fast.

FranceB.jpg

It has been an exciting and fast paced game so far. Very fun.

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OK - the weather is still doing its best to throw me off the rails with mud still widespread in May, but it hasnt hampered me too much this turn as I should now be able to take Paris next turn. The dog leg assault I spoke about last time has worked a treat - his units have moved away and recentred around Paris without entrenchment, although I am disappointed to find that he did not make a mistake and leave Paris without a fully entrenched garrison. This turn my armour drove hard for paris, some airborne infantry supplied a bit of extra punch and an army plus an anti tank unit were destroyed at the city gates. I did not have the support units to take Reims also, but other towns on the way have also been mopped up so with luck my supply next turn will still be good.

End of turn finished here:

ww2turn9outsideparis.jpg

No arrows required - you can clearly see how he has evacuated his stronger flanks as the full power of blitzkrieg has jinked and then driven to Paris, and French units surrounded along the way have been wiped out.

I have enough units/air in range now that I am hopeful of an end to the war in the west next turn with the fall of Paris. With the extra time I have bought myself I am now considering my options. Strike early at Russia? Perhaps hit Spain? I am preparing an assault on Oslo in the wings and marshalling my U boats just in case an opportunity presents itself. Ultimate goal, however, remains Moscow in 1942.

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Well… it’s now the end of May and France is still managing to hold out. I think it is very likely that Al will force France to surrender this upcoming turn. He may not take Paris but by destruction of enough French units France may collapse like a house of cards. Morale is now sadly at 12%.

I’ve positioned my units (note French armor makes a surprise appearance) in such a way as to make it exceedingly difficult to take Paris by a lightning strike. The Paris corps is dug in at 6 and full strength. He can try to batter her down by air… a costly approach, however due to the surrounding units and ZOCs it may be difficult to actually take this turn.

ParisA.jpg

He may be forced to eliminate the blocking units first before going for Paris, which could likely cause France to surrender anyway. I’ve got my fingers crossed that she will last just one more frustrating turn for him. I think regardless by having France hold on by her fingernails… and having him waste loads of cash operating his army across Germany… I’ve won a tactical victory in disrupting his plans. Remember he attacked in October/November and now it’s almost June. It’s time to start shooting the Generals or at least firing them… :P

I also had a decision event concerning the deployment of commonwealth troops to Egypt. Essentially… get them now below strength or later at full strength. I will let Al wonder which one I took. I also hammered the occupied ports again in the lowlands… reducing them to 0. I intend to make an invasion of England as difficult as possible.

DecisionA.jpg

I am betting that Al will likely strike me first in Egypt and then invade Russia in April 41. I may let him cross into Egypt because it makes Russia a bit nervous which translates into higher war readiness and cash. Invading England does the same. He’s already irritated Stalin. Having Russia go active early would be a nice bonus for me.

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Morning all - no image for you this time as it would look almost identical to the last. Curse upon curse - the weather stayed bad and mud meant I could not get my second wave of units to Paris. As a first time player of this scenario I am interested to see just how many units France has. I wonder how difficult it would have been to attack in May/June 1940? There seem to be a lot of French units in the field!

(note to developers - has anyone actually been to Western Europe at the end of May? As I live there I can tell you categorically that is is almost never muddy at the end of May...!)

Anyway I settled instead for crushing as many French units as possible, and 4 armies plus 2 corps were dealt with and French morale was reduced to 3% - but they did not surrender.:-( French Armour was also pounded by Stukas. Altogether this will help a great deal with experience, but it has put me behind timetable so I am pondering my next move a bit now. My attack on Norway is nearly ready so that will go ahead whatever.

My quandary actually is Spain. I am very tempted to invade, but to do it properly it looks on this map as though I would need at least 5 turns of decent weather to get to Madrid. Will I get that now? Should I instead look to the Balkans, or North Africa? You will remember that my initial plan was not to attack in North Africa, but that may need some reevaluation if there is not enough left of the 1940 summer season to conduct operations in mainland Europe.

Either way I am still looking at an invasion of Russia as early as I dare do it.

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Well… it’s the end of June… if I recall correctly June 28th for Al’s turn. France is still in the game but she will surrender next turn I “think” regardless of Paris falling. The French got tired of not attacking and went over to the offensive this turn. I hit an armored unit, army, HQ and an air unit. I did some nice damage to the armor and army… dropping them to 6 and 5. The HQ I took down 1 step… not in the picture but along the Maginot line. The air battle I am not sure how much I took down. I figured France is done and well why not inflict what little damage I could. You know… rub salt in the wound. I started the turn at 3% and after my attacks ended at 0. France is done.

FranceJuneA.jpg

Now… I feel it is important to take a moment to discuss strategy. First he attacked and surprised me in a brilliant move. I don’t like to be surprised in this game as it usually ends with catastrophic results. I was able to recover due to a number of reasons and moves. Weather was very important to allowing me to hold onto France for a couple more turns, however my strategy was to simply impede Al’s progress and keep him away from Paris. At no point did I launch any offensives/attacks. Had I done so, it would have weakened my units allowing the Germans to destroy them much quicker. In addition, you lose morale when your units die soooo as France you want to keep your morale from falling too quickly. So I let Al do all the work and batter my units silly as they fell back, focusing on repair and replacement. Also my deployments were key in making sure that he had to destroy units in order to advance on Paris. I gave him some nice juicy targets that were just simply too ripe for the picking and he had to stop and kill. As he crossed the border into France, I gave him a path by leaving a couple of key towns (Verdun and Chalons) open near the Maginot Line, which turned his entire offensive south instead of continuing straight on in. (Path of least resistance kind of stuff.) The alternative for him would have been to batter through a dug in French line in winter. Not a fun thing to do. It would have meant taking unwanted casualties. (look back at some of the screen shots and you will see what I mean.) Channeling the enemy to where you want them to go can be very important in this game… especially on the Eastern Front later in the game. There are some very creative ways to do this in the East.

I also had set a trap for Al with the French navy a couple turns back where I sent them in exposed bombarding ports. He did not take the bait. I had the entire Royal navy sitting just out of sight complete with carriers waiting for the German Navy to sally forth. Lucky for him he did not take the bait. My goal there had been to weaken the German navy to the point where it would have been risky to launch Sea Lion. The German navy is untouched and strong. He also chose Operation Z this turn. Got a note on the beginning of my turn. The Germans are building carriers.

All in all I think I got very lucky in where Al chose to attack and was able to build upon that with what I had to make the invasion of France as difficult as possible. This game can be unforgiving at times… but due to the size and scope of the map, many times you can recover and build up a defense and strategy to fix mistakes you made. Surprise offensives and the unexpected happen frequently in this game. It’s why I think this is the best WWII game ever in the SC series. I am firmly addicted to it. It’s also why I feel I am in for a difficult game in the East. I do not think Al will approach another offensive against me without thinking it through very carefully, coming up with a creative strategy and applying overwhelming force. I have no idea what I am in for and can’t wait to see what develops even if he crushes me completely. It’s a real joy to play with Al.

As a side note: I was discussing Al’s surprise aggressive invasion with Bill (one of the devs) and how completely unprepared and surprised I was… and well we were joking (at least I was) that the AAR may be over by 1940. :P I could literally see him hammering his forehead into his keyboard and groaning that I had been caught with my pants down and well people would think the campaign was not well balanced, poorly made and not want to give it a chance. The game ends in 40??? Really? Well… it looks now like we will have a full game, which I think is a testament to the engine, design and all of the combined effort that went into this campaign by Hubert, Bill and all of the Beta testers. It is really a lot of fun and you are able to do things with this game that you were not able to do in other SC games. I can’t wait for everyone to get their hands on it… with that said it’s almost finished but still needs a bit of work.

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Well, somewhat belatedly the weather turns fine, and France falls. With French morale at 0 I didnt bother to do much at all other than eliminate a couple of easy units in search of more experience. I also sallied forth with some U boats to kill 2 French ships: the National Morale boost is handy (to anyone new to the latest SC incarnation destroying enemy ships provides very good NM boosts for the side that does the sinking...), although in this ww2 scenario I dont know if NM is something that will need to be massaged in this way. Anyway - I did it, and hope that any British naval revenge will not be sufficient to stop my U boats escaping.

Now I must take a long look at the map and decide on my next moves. One of the problems I have is that I have never played this scenario before and dont quite know how the game plays. Every wargamer knows that, no matter how well balanced a game may be, there are things worth doing and things definitely not worth doing, and I am in the dark here. Still - that's part of the fun in this AAR!

One piece of luck that turn too - a diplomatic hit got a big return in Romania leading to an instant Romanian alliance. That's good news: Romanian oil at a slightly earlier stage than expected will come in very handy.

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France finally fell on July 5th. The British people will fight on. Not much to report this turn. The UK is builing up to repel an invasion. I recognized the Free French and Churchill authorized and the navy executed the attack on the Vichey French Fleet. The Royal navy for the most part is in position and fighter command is ready for the Battle of Britain. Kind of a slow turn in general which I am sure is a nice break for both Al and myself. Call it a strategic pause as we both regroup and prepare for our next steps. It is the middle of July now. I feel Britain is safe from invasion for the moment.

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Not much to report this turn - refitting, moving, new plans etc etc. One British Corps that unwisely stuck around in France was destroyed - 2 others sitting in ports will follow the same way if Marc leaves them there much longer. My defeat of France took longer than I hoped, but quicker than might have been the case had I waited until spring, so now I must make best use of the extra time available. My only simmering disappointment so far is the lack of research progress. I invested in this early and I am at max points for Germany and nearly max for Italy. In return I have had very little indeed. As I said in a recent post this makes SC uniquely different every time you fire it up, but for this AAR I need my luck to turn otherwise future operations are going to suffer badly.

However for any newcomers to SC here is something to take on board - the power of paras. My one major move this turn was the conquest of Norway done like this:

Norway.jpg

A classic long distance combination of force. Paras land, identify the enemy, Tac Air swoops in to launch a telling blow, paras finish them off and then occupy.

It is a devastating tactic in any circumstances, and with paras at a base range of 8 in this scenario it is one with much potential. Defence in any of the recent forms of SC is required in depth becuase a good player using long range air recon will quickly seize undefended cities with paras at range.

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Not much to report this turn. It is the middle of July. Just preparing for where I expect him to hit next. I could have easily contested Norway and taken a couple of port cities. I still might, turning Norway into a quagmire for Germany. I have done it in a number of games and succeeded. At the moment I feel it's of prime importance to concentrate troops I would have sent there in England in the event he decided to attempt a channel crossing.

Speaking of a channel crossing though it is possible... I think at this point it would be very difficult to pull off. Al would simultaneously need to destroy the RAF, Royal Navy and land with enough force to secure and hold a bridgehead. The UK's army is at this point large. In addition... the UK still holds 2 key french channel ports denying him the opportunity to use them as platforms. Last turn they held 3... he took 1 back. 2 of the major ports in the Lowlands have been rendered unusable by a combination of naval bombardment and strategic bombing. I think he might still be able to pull off a crossing before fall... but it would be a very tough fight with lots of casualties on both sides and would likely drag on well into 1941's summer and possibly fall. The economic gains in the short term would be offset by losses & steep costs of amphibious operations and would likely leave him vulnerable to a Russian sledgehammer around May 1941... that would be my guess for when Russia would enter the war on her own. Likely his next focus will be North Africa and Russia. The Italian Fleet is huge and I can see him utilizing it in conjunction with a land advance.

Can't wait to see what will develop next.

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